


nothing

by ossapher



Series: The Macaroniverse -- Lams Modern AU [16]
Category: American Revolution RPF
Genre: (poorly) coping with disability, Aftermath of Violence, self-injurious impulses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 11:33:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15907458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ossapher/pseuds/ossapher
Summary: John copes, or fails to, with the likelihood that his injury will have permanent consequences





	nothing

**Author's Note:**

> This is the third in a series of five related works, all having to do with John and the physical sensations he experiences in the aftermath of being shot. This one is probably the saddest-- please be sure you read the tags before proceeding. Many thanks to [a-classic-fool](https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_classic_fool/pseuds/a_classic_fool) for her always-excellent and extraordinarily fast beta work.

“Is that one poke, or two?”

John thinks about it. “Um… hard to say.”

“How about now?”

A vague feeling of pressure in his right pinky finger. “Uh… one?”

“Okay, good. Now, one, or two?”

John struggles against the impulse to peek. He’s facing the wall of the occupational therapist’s office, his arm stretched out to the other side, where he can’t see, and being gently prodded with sharp things to assess his nerve function. “Uh… trick question? You aren’t poking at all?”

“One poke, or two?” Her voice gives nothing away.

“None,” John says, more confidently.

“One, or two?”

“None again.”

“And now?” As she says it, John feels two points of insistent pressure half an inch apart on his thumb.

“Two.”

“Good. We’re done. I’ll be right back.”

She leaves the room and returns a moment later with another, older-looking therapist who shakes his hand. _Wow,_ John thinks, _she must be having a bad day_. The woman smiles like she has a toothache. She repeats exactly the same test as the first, to John’s growing apprehension.

“I’m just a trainee,” the first woman says. “She’s checking my work.”

John understands the importance of on-the-job training in medicine, having only barely finished his own training period before being shot. But something in her voice—some emotion she hasn’t yet learned to stifle—worries him.

The second woman, finished with her exam, gives the first a nod. The first grimaces.

“Okay, John,” she says, clasping her hands together. “This wasn’t entirely unexpected, given the nature of your injury, but it isn’t ideal. Your nerves have been damaged. They can recover and even regrow to some extent, but there’s a lot of variability in people’s recoveries. We’re going to work really hard with you to get back all the function we can, but… but it’s rare, in cases like this, that that will be one hundred percent. You may be looking at significant functional impairment.”

“Will I be able to work?” is the only thing John can think to ask. Please let him keep his job— it's the only thing that he's been looking forward to, some days. “I'm an EMT.”

“That's…” The younger woman's eyes dart to the older, who says nothing. “That's not really clear right now. It all depends how you recover.”

“Okay, so what can I do to recover?”

“You're young,” she says. “That's good. And we received notification from your father that he's willing to pay for any and all therapy you need, beyond what your insurance will cover. That's another big point in your favor. But with the biology… there's really no telling.”

John feels like there's a hole in his chest to go along with the still-healing one in his shoulder. It occurs to him why the second doctor had smiled at him like that. It wasn’t her having the bad day, it was him. He just didn’t know it yet.

 

* * *

 

He delivers the news to Alex mechanically, staring at the chaotic abstract painting on the wall opposite their couch. He can't bear to see Alex's face.

“Oh, John,” Alex sighs when he's finished. “That’s— that’s really fucking… I mean, I guess we don’t know how things will all… it’s just… it…” He takes a deep breath. “I'm so sorry. Is there any way I can help you feel better?”

Damn, this really _is_ bad, if Alex’s usual eloquence has been replaced by canned lines straight out of a _How to help someone in crisis_ tipsheet. “I don’t know,” John says. He focuses on the interplay of red and blue before him. He never realized before quite how much the red resembles blood. That could definitely change his interpretation of the painting. The blue, he thinks, is a noble sort of shade, but when overlaid with the saturated red the effect is ugly, a harsh purple-brown that reminds him of old rusted chain link fence.

Alex is talking again. Something with a rising inflection. John should answer.

“I don't know.”

“Okay, I’ll stay,” Alex says, curling his feet up on the couch and leaning into John’s body, a solid weight. Something to feel in the muted, post-shockwave world, but only barely.

 _This won’t be forever. Time’s still going forward, and so am I. Just hang on a little longer, and this will end_. Thoughts like that have kept John strong in the face of pain.

But this isn’t pain, this is nothing. And maybe it won’t end. John stares down at his own hand and for just a moment he feels something: he hates it, hates it with his whole body, hates that it won’t just fucking _work_ like it’s supposed to so John can be an EMT again. He wants to slam it through the glass coffee table. That’ll teach it how to behave.

Alex’s hand rubs up and down his back, and just as suddenly the impulse is gone, replaced by incredible exhaustion, like hate was a marathon he ran in an instant. And his hand is just a hand again. Kind of a pitiable example, actually, all swollen still because he's been on his feet all day, with yellowing bruises under the knuckles where the blood pooled after his surgery. _Poor hand_ , he thinks suddenly. _It's not your fault you got hurt._ But the thought comes from a long way off. Mostly he's just… numb.

A drop of water falls onto the hand, and another as John blinks in shock.

“That's right, John, let it out,” Alex soothes, grabbing a box of tissues from the coffee table that John so recently pondered smashing.

“Let what out?” John asks, and all he can think, once he realizes he actually might be crying, is that he hadn't felt that either.


End file.
